A Wedding in December_ A Novel - Anita Shreve [65]
“Of course I remember,” she said.
“It was just a matter of time,” Harrison said.
Nora walked her plate to the sink. “I never saw Stephen after that,” she said.
“No.”
“This . . . this does us no good,” Nora said.
“I wonder if that’s the purpose of these reunions,” Harrison said. “To unburden ourselves of secrets. To say what couldn’t be said then.”
“If it keeps snowing at this rate,” Nora said, “we’ll have at least three or four inches by morning. They say four.”
“You knew about the snow?”
Nora nodded.
“Even this morning, when we were talking about how beautiful the day was, you knew the forecast?”
“Front coming down from Canada.”
“Oh, go ahead,” Harrison said, “blame Canada.”
Nora laughed. Harrison walked to the sink and stood behind her. He wanted to kiss the back of her neck. It seemed to Harrison that every moment of the day had been leading to this one. That it would be the end of one particular narrative. Possibly the beginning of another one.
“This is none of my business, but was Carl faithful to you?” Harrison asked.
“In reality, yes,” she said quickly. “In his imagination, no.”
Harrison was silenced by her answer.
“It’s quarter to two,” Nora said. Noticing the smudge of flour on her sleeve, she tried to brush it off.
Harrison sensed that Nora might be free now to let him touch her. That power, and his understanding of the consequences—for him, for her, for Evelyn—made him slightly lightheaded. His desire, apparent from the moment he’d first seen her in the lobby, had been, throughout the day, both sharpened by proximity and memory and dulled by alcohol and experience. If he let her go, he knew that he would regret it. For months. Possibly for years. If he kissed her, he would also regret it. Perhaps for years.
She squirted dishwashing liquid onto a plate and took up a sponge. He put a hand on her shoulder. “You go to bed,” he said. “I’ll take care of these.”
They might have been married for years. A recompense of sorts.
Nora slid away from him. She tore off a sheet of paper towel from a roll and dried her hands. “You should sleep, too,” she said.
In his jacket and dress shoes, Harrison walked out into the snow. Should anyone be looking from an upstairs window, he was a man who’d left his briefcase in his car. It couldn’t wait until morning. What Harrison couldn’t wait for was the medicinal air, the pinging frost on his face. He felt his vision clearing. The cold air punished his lungs. Nora had been right when she’d spoken of the stick and the pond, the muck disturbed and eddying up into the water. It had been dangerous to come here, he who had avoided danger for years. He slipped a little on the accumulating snow. An inch, two inches already. He opened the back door of the rented Taurus and took out his briefcase. In it, there was a manuscript by an English novelist that was absorbing and superbly written. Harrison already knew the work was good. He’d read the British reviews. He could have published it without giving it a glance, but tonight, with any luck, the book would be his ticket to a world away from the Berkshires. With any luck, it would be his ticket to sleep.
Harrison stepped away from the car. In his shoes with their leather soles, the walking was treacherous. He made his way past the front steps of the inn and across a lawn that had only this afternoon been green. Should his fellow insomniac be watching from the window, Harrison’s footprints in the snow would give away his trajectory. Harrison moved until he could see around the corner of the inn itself to the little annex in which Nora had her apartment. The lights were still on. He thought of the veranda door to her room, of a possibly theatrical entrance, the odds that she might allow him in. He believed that they were high.
He had no gloves on. His jacket was made for fall. His head was bare, wet now with melted snow. Harrison didn’t want a life filled with regret. He believed himself too old for romance. What he wanted was a second chance, an opportunity to turn back the clock. But almost